16.9 C
Nicosia
Friday, March 29, 2024

The liar and the bitter: Nikos Christodoulidis – Averof Neophytou

Must read

& Omicron; & psi; & epsilon; ύ & tau; & eta; & sigmaf; & kappa; & pi; ; & iota; & kappa; & rho; & alpha; & mu; έ & nu; & omicron; & sigmaf ;: & Nu; ί & kappa; & omicron; & sigmaf; & Chi; & rho; & iota; & sigma; & tau; & omicron; & delta; & omicron; & upsilon; et; lambda & et & sigmaf; & ndash; & Alpha; & beta; έ & rho; & omega; & phi; & Nu; & epsilon; & omicron; & phi; ύ & tau; & omicron; & upsilon;

The president of DISY Averof Neophytou in his interview with Politis last Sunday left very serious accusations against the former Foreign Minister and candidate for the presidency Nikos Christodoulidis in relation to the passport scandal.

p>Responding to those who accuse the government of oligarchy in the Cyprus issue and of corrupt policies, in a pleasant way he mixed Nikos Christodoulidis in the deck of his answer. He told us: “What did the Foreign Minister have to deal with? The Cyprus issue and passports. Do not forget that CIPA – the Cyprus Investment Promotion Agency – was under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “And there were heated discussions in the Council of Ministers when he was about to leave the Ministry of Commerce to go to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which ultimately had the responsibility of promoting passports.”

In short, Mr. Averof Neophytou, the Cyprus Investment Program, which was largely based on the sale of passports, was for some time under the supervision of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, namely Foreign Minister Nikos Christodoulidis.

The answer >

Nikos Christodoulidis hurried in the following days with his statements to clarify that when he took over CIPA, the Cyprus Investment Program and the issuance of passports had been abolished. This is, of course, a lie, since the available evidence shows something different. Mr. Christodoulidis took over as Minister of Foreign Affairs during Anastasiadis's second term, ie on March 1, 2018. His ministry officially took over CIPA and the passport promotion policy on June 24, 2020. The passport sale program at the time was well underway, with no intention or and an indication for its abolition. This emerged after Al Jazeera reports in September 2020, with the result that five months after Mr. Christodoulidis took over, that is, on November 1, 2020, the program was abolished.

According to our information, Mr. Christodoulidis from the first moment he took over the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2018 claimed CIPA and the Cyprus Investment Program from the Ministry of Commerce, arguing that modern diplomacy today has a dominant role in promoting investment in a country. His request, of course, clashed with the refusal of the Ministry of Finance initially, but after the intervention of the President of the Republic, Mr. Christodoulidis achieved what he wanted.

After the abolition

Even after the abolition of the program on November 1, 2020, one of the first moves of Mr. Christodoulidis was to convene the Association of Large Investments in Cyprus, which was the main beneficiary of KEP, since to get a passport one had to buy a luxury apartment or villa. He assured the developers that through the accession of Cyprus to the Schengen area, they could issue gold residence visas for their clients.

Specifically, on February 1, 2021, Foreign Minister Christodoulidis convened a meeting of the Association of Large Developments, which was attended by big names in the industry, such as the companies Leptos, Lanitis, Iliadis, and the Attorney General Andreas Dimitriadis. Cyprus's accession to the Schengen area, which, as noted by all, will undermine the plan for the permanent establishment of foreign investors in Cyprus.

As Mr. Christodoulidis explained, in this way “the rent of the first house will be allowed in order to be competitive in relation to other destinations with residency programs”. At the same meeting, Mr. Christodoulidis also referred to the importance of Invest Cyprus that came to replace the Cyprus Investment Program, emphasizing that Cyprus must develop a new Brand, explaining the importance of Permanent Residency, which in combination with the admission of Cyprus in the Schengen area will allow the continuation of attracting investors.

According to a reliable source at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, during this period special emphasis was given to Mr. Christodoulidis to gain a serious foothold among the businessmen of Cyprus. Relevant statements were made yesterday at the DISY conference by the mayor of Paphos, Faidon Faidonos, who asked to investigate the relationship of Mr. Christodoulidis with the passports. As we were told by members of the diplomatic service, Mr. Christodoulidis during his ministry “made more contacts with businessmen than with ambassadors of foreign countries.” At the same time, there was a shift in attracting Chinese businessmen with the Cypriot embassy in Beijing for days Nikos Christodoulidis working with great vigor in this direction.

Misleading

< p>In short, the attempt to distance Nikos Christodoulidis from passports and the Cypriot practice in general to attract investors to sell villas to the members of the Association of Large Structures, and is misleading and false, since he claimed unjustifiably, for no reason. CIPA and the sale of passports, but also because as a minister he voted in favor of naturalizations in the Council of Ministers.

For those who know, of course, Nikos Christodoulidis has always been interested in passports, especially when they concerned Russian businessmen and oligarchs, hence his public reaction in 2017. On May 26, 2017, Nikos Christodoulidis as a government spokesman responded to a Bloomberg report entitled: “European passports for sale in Cyprus, a lure for wealthy Russians”. As we read on the website of the television station Alpha, “the government spokesman, in an article in Bloomberg, rejected the accusations that Cyprus is using its status as a member state to give citizenship and passports to rich Russians in exchange for money. Nikos Christodoulidis explains the status that applies in Cyprus for the citizenship program. That is, in order for a third-country national to obtain a residence permit, he will have to buy a house worth at least 500,000 euros, but also invest in the island. This, he added, presupposes that the applicants will establish and maintain ties with Cyprus for the rest of their lives. The investment should amount to 2-2.5 million euros in some cases, amounts which are much higher than programs of other countries “.

Of course, Mr. Christodoulidis did not explain, even and in retrospect, what did Malaysian swindler Joe Lowe have to do with Cyprus, who obtained a passport after a few hours in Cyprus, as well as various Russian oligarchs and guardians from Afghanistan and Cambodia, who are internationally wanted./p>

Otherwise, today he appears ala kart as the candidate of everything. In the majority of the naive, he appears as anti-systemic and above any suspicion of involvement in matters of issuing sinful passports. To the voters of DISY, of course, whom he also claims, he shouts that the Anastasiadis government was not corrupt, on the contrary he produced an important work of which he is proud.

The Bitter

The bitter of the company, namely Averof Neophytou, for whom so far no involvement in the sale of passports has been proven (it should be emphasized, of course, that he never condemned this practice) in his interview with Politis tried to expose Mr. Christodoulidis as part of corruption.

The bitterness of Averof Neophytos is partly justified. He has made a name for himself behind every tramp in the territory of the Republic of Cyprus, in contrast to Mr. Christodoulidis who is considered by the whole world to be superior, honest and a good Christian. In fact, since 2013, Averof Neophytou has made an effort to revive the Cypriot economy through the distorted model of selling passports, in contrast to Mr. Christodoulidis, who shows that through all his moves he made a personal election campaign./p>

In this case, at some point we all have to admit it and applaud him for a long time: Mr. Christodoulidis is literally insurmountable. There was the shadow of Nikos Anastasiadis, whom DIKO characterizes as the leader of the most corrupt government, but this party will support him in the presidency as the most honest of the people. He is also supported by 40% of DISY because he considers him a worthy follower of the great work left behind by President Anastasiadis. 30% of AKEL supports him because he wants to punish his leadership.

Conclusion: A large part of the Cypriot people do not want to see Mr. Christodoulidis as he appears. He started his election campaign by stealing Kasoulidis' speech, then snatched a page showing the next 25,000 members as his followers and supporters, as a result of which he downloaded it on Facebook. Finally, he lies to us bluntly that he himself had nothing to do with the sale of passports that made Cyprus rent internationally.

Of course, there is always a contradiction. Whatever Christodoulidis did, he is still better than the other party leaders, some of our fellow citizens say. The people are always right.

Source: politis.com.cy

- Advertisement -AliExpress WW

More articles

- Advertisement -AliExpress WW

Latest article